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The Pride Wars
The Pride Wars, while perhaps not the greatest war in the history of creation, is still by far the biggest war to happen within the memory of even the eldest elf. It completely changes the face of the world, and the lives of all who live in it. A Brief History The world is split into many parts, but most scholars tend to divide it into four main sections: Elgerath, the Civilized Lands - This section of the world encompass the Elvish forests, Human Empire, and every other area between it and the ocean that is not over the border of Dharak. These lands are for the most part fertile, relatively safe, and well populated. It is rich in vegetation, though lacking in minerals compared to Dharak. Dharak, the Wild Frontier - This section of the world encompasses the Lizardman Mudflats, and stretches from there up to the ocean and as far east as the Dwarven Mountains. This area is extremely lacking compared to Elgerath in terms of vegetation and sustenance in general, not including the underground areas cultivated by Dwarves and Giants. The Black Wastes - This section of the world is largely unexplored, as it is occupied by countless undead and otherwordly horrors. Some say The 12th God sleeps here, but not even the Dwarves have dared explore it. The Beyond - This section of the world may not even exist - there have been countless rumors of lands over the oceans and past the Black Wastes for millenia, but none have ever been able to verify it. Scholars made this term up to speak in hypotheticals of 'new lands' and it stuck as a catch all term. In general the borders between lands are rather fluid - the Black Wastes has slowly expanded over the years for instance. The changes in the borders leading up to the Pride Wars themselves were the main issue however. Once Dharak was a lot more fertile than it once was. The Lizardman Mudflaps were once an expansive swamp for instance, and the desert the Genesi inhabit was once a part of the same great forest the Elves and Firn inhabit. However, when the God Maelstramos was brutally murdered by The 12th God, his ruined corpse of elemental energy was tossed aside and ravaged the land, forever blighting a vast majority of Dharak. The land recovered, but only to a mere fraction of its former bounty. This presented many a problem for its inhabitants. Populations plummeted, then stabilized eventuall. Wars over resources became more common, and entire cultures around scavenging and scrounging took route. It certainly didn't help when the Giants began to pouch other races in the region to rear as slaves for both their own use and to sell to the Elves as cheap labor. The end result was the entire region was a lot more volatile than it was before. This was especially apparent when it came to the Lizardmen. Living near the border of Elgerath, they took to leading their hunting parties into human lands to gather wild plants and poach game. Eventually they began raiding human settlements directly, though only in terms of small skirmishes as Lizardmen have a tribal based society. This of course lead to resistance, but eventually things flattened out to a strange stalemate where raiding was just a part of life. This slowly changed over the course of centuries. Eventually the numerous human nations formed a grand Empire, which lead to a centralized military force. This meant that there was a much bigger army in the whole human race's hands than there were before, and since the Lizardmen were the main threat the border was heavily reinforced. Raiding became a lot more risky, with far more of a little pay off. The Lizardman tribes suffered tremendously. The real trigger for the war however was the Great Expansion that slowly occured over the eighty odd years leading up to The Pride Wars proper. As mentioned above Dharak was always richer in mineral wealth than Elgerath, but being as there had been a stalemate for so long the humans had never really taken advantage of it. Now that they had a centralized government, a huge army, and a large amount of citizenry itching for more wealth, they had the power and opportunity to take what they wanted. The Lizardman territories shrunk tremendously as Humans struck their own claim on the land. The border swing was tremendous, as the Humans took large chunks of Dharak for their frontier towns and villages. Where there was ore, Humans came. Eventually they extended beyond Lizardman lands as well, though for the most part they only took mostly uninhabited chunks of desert and nipped on the heels of the lands of the Dwarves. Slowly but surely, Humans were taking Dharak and not even make something of it - it was simply a place to put their mines and carry the wealth back to the heart of the Human Empire. Of course to the Humans there was nothing wrong with this - the Lizardmen were nomads, so it wasn't really considered 'taking their land' as they had no permanent settlements to speak of. And besides, they'd been at war for centuries, it was just that the Humans were winning now. This would not keep up for nearly as long as the Humans wanted. In this troubled times, two men were born - Ellinous Humanis, future Emperor of the Human Empire. And Grognar Blackfang, son of a Chief to a relatively small tribe of Lizardmen. Though born on opposide sides of the world, both sides would soon know them as the men who forever changed it. Leading Up to the War Write the second section of your page here.